Doc Day Afternoon
by Save vs. Magic
Summary: Set after "Delinquent Justin": Justin announces out of the blue that he wants to go to med school after college. Alex thinks he'd make an awful doctor. Justin naturally disagrees, Alex challenges him to prove it, and sexy hi-jinks ensue. One-shot. JALEX


**TITLE:** _Doc Day Afternoon_

**RATING/CONTENT:** M/NC-17 for explicit depictions of consensual incest between siblings (eventually, I promise), fairly strong language, references to underage drinking, and general shenanigans. First-time, non-angsty Jalex, from Alex's POV.

**WORD COUNT:** Um, 16K+ in 4 parts. Because apparently I can't even write smut without a three-act structure. If you appreciate a long, slow burn and some character study in your porn, though, this one's for you.

**DISCLAIMER:** I don't own _Wizards of Waverly Place_ nor any of the characters contained herein, no copyright infringement is intended, yadda yadda yadda, please don't sue.

**SPOILERS:** Up to Episode 3.23, _Captain Jim Bob Sherwood_.

**SUMMARY:** A sequel/continuation of sorts of Episode 3.22, _Delinquent Justin_. Seemingly out of the blue, Justin announces that he wants to go to med school after college. Alex thinks he'd make a terrible doctor. Justin naturally disagrees, Alex challenges him to prove it, and sexy hi-jinks ensue. Written for the "Paging Dr. J" prompt on the omgjustinalex kink meme at LiveJournal.

**AUTHOR'S NOTE:** Cross-posted from my LiveJournal, where it first appeared on August 22, 2010. Written when I was still brand-spanking-new to the fandom, this was the first Jalex fic I deemed worthy enough to actually show to other people, and my first time writing smut, ever. (Seriously, I'd never written a sex scene before this. What a pair to start with, eh?) Please be kind. ;)

* * *

**i.**

It's 1:30pm on the Saturday after Justin graduates, so naturally Alex is just now waking up. Yawning, she untangles herself from her sheets, swings her legs over the side of her bed, and tries to stand up. She lurches as the room spins around her, and she realizes she's still more than a little tipsy from that house party last night. She grabs the edge of her desk to steady herself and burps, wrinkling her nose as she re-tastes one of the three rum and cherry Cokes she put away the night before. (Well, the three she remembers, anyway.)

Rum and cherry Coke has always been her kryptonite. Her yummy, yummy kryptonite.

She stands there immobile for a few seconds, waiting for the room to stop spinning and willing herself not to throw up. She looks down at herself, clad only in last night's underwear—a sleep-creased white camisole and her lucky Little Miss Naughty panties—and debates for a moment whether she should get dressed and make herself semi-presentable before venturing out into the loft.

Let's see: her parents are at a supplier's convention in Atlantic City for the weekend. Harper's visiting her parents in Chicago. Max is camping upstate with Alfred and his dad. And Justin...Justin is probably not home, but even if he is, he practically has an aneurism at the sight of girl underwear, even if she isn't in it at the time. Which is always fun to watch, not to mention a great way to chase him out of the room so she can have the TV all to herself for the day.

So clearly, she smiles to herself, that's a no.

She does take a moment to pull on her Uggs, though—because holy crap, even in the summer the friggin' hardwood floors are like ice with the air conditioning—and makes a pit stop in the bathroom to pee, wash off last night's make-up, brush her teeth and make absolutely sure she doesn't need to puke, not necessarily in that order. Then, gathering her hair into a sloppy ponytail on top of her head, she staggers down the hallway towards the spiral staircase. Still pleasantly buzzed, careful to hold the railing, she peers over it into the living room, not sure whether she wants Justin to be there or not.

"You broke curfew last night," he says from the couch without looking up. His voice positively drips with condescension.

Alex grins briefly, wickedly, at the top of his head, then schools her features into an expression of bored nonchalance as she pads the rest of the way down the stairs.

"Well duh," she snorts as she crosses behind him to the kitchenette. "I'm seventeen, and Mom and Dad are out of town. Do the math, egghead. Is there coffee? Please say there's coffee."

Of course there's coffee, because he's Justin: a full, freshly-brewed pot waiting just for her, and it smells heavenly. As she pours herself a gigantic mug, and fills it nearly halfway with sugar, she also notices a just-washed frying pan, spatula, and breakfast dishes in the sink. The corner of her mouth quirks up a little, and she pulls open the fridge to find a plate made up for her: scrambled eggs, two pancakes, greasy sausage and bacon, otherwise known as Alex Russo's Patented Hangover Cure.

God, he's such an absolute doll, sometimes. She'd love him to pieces if she weren't obligated by sibling law to, y'know, hate his guts and all.

But she merely grunts in acknowledgment, as though she were expecting it to be there (which she kind of halfway was), then tears the saran wrap off the plate and tosses it onto the counter without comment. Because that's what they do.

"You're going to be grounded again," Justin says, still not looking away from the TV. "You know that, right? Probably for life, this time."

"Only if you rat me out," Alex replies. She tosses the plate into the microwave and sets the timer.

Justin snorts. "Well, I think we both know that's a given."

"Oh, for Christ's sake, Justin! Pull the stick out of your ass, for once. If you actually had a life, you would have been out partying last night, too. That's what normal people our age do, not—"

She frowns at him over the rim of her coffee mug, noticing for the first time that he's got a yellow legal pad propped up on one knee, his pen scribbling furiously across it as he stares intently at the screen.

"Are you taking notes?" she asks, incredulous. "Ohmigod, are you actually so boring that you've turned TV into homework?"

"Alex—" he sighs, turning to give her a long-suffering look. But then his jaw drops, and his face flushes, and his breath whistles in his nose as he breathes in sharply. His eyes go wide as dinner plates as they travel all the way down her body and back up, taking in for the first time what she's got on. Or, y'know, what she doesn't.

(They linger a nanosecond or two on her chest, she notices. Because, hi, thin camisole plus standing in front of an open refrigerator equals perkiness. Which she totally can't help and didn't do on purpose, or anything. She didn't invent biology.)

She struggles to fight the grin that threatens to split across her face as she cocks an eyebrow at him, as if to ask him what his damage is.

"Alex," he says again, in that breathy, gravelly, scandalized voice that lights up the pleasure centers of her brain like a Christmas tree, "what the hell are you wearing?"

Alex shrugs one shoulder lazily as she takes another gulp of coffee. "Just what I wore to bed last night. I didn't want to get dressed, I haven't showered yet."

"So go shower!" he demands.

"In a minute, jeez!" Alex growls back. The microwave's timer beeps, and she walks around the island to pull it open. "I just need to eat first! I'm starving!"

"But...you're...it's...I'm..." Justin stammers, then wrenches his eyes shut (finally) and shakes his head. "Can't you at least go put a robe on, or something?"

"Meh, can't be bothered," she says, grabbing some silverware out of a drawer and closing it with her hip. Balancing it and her coffee in one hand and the steaming plate in the other, she pads her way into the living room and plops down on the couch next to him, swinging her legs up into his lap. Immediately, he jumps up and scootches over to the absolute opposite edge, as far away from her as he can get without standing up.

"Jesus, Justin, watch it! You almost made me spill!"

"Go eat in the kitchen, then!"

She glares at him levelly over a mouthful of sausage, eggs and pancakes. "I always eat my Hangover Cure with my feet up on the couch, Justin. You know this. It's a very important step in the healing process. If you don't like it, leave."

"Don't talk with your mouth full," he scolds her automatically. His face is still three shades of red, and his eyes keep darting around the room as though he doesn't know where to put them. He clears his throat awkwardly. "Look, I'm in the middle of something, here. You're distracting me."

Alex allows herself a small smile of triumph at that as she shovels another forkful into her mouth. "Ugh, I hate the way the bacon gets all rubbery after you nuke it."

"Well maybe if you'd actually been awake when I made it, you wouldn't have had to nuke it," Justin says, sounding vaguely hurt.

She looks up at him again, and wipes the back of her mouth with her hand. "Well maybe if you actually made it at a decent hour, I would be," she says, but nudges him playfully with the toe of her boot to take the sting out of it.

"Oh, whatever," he says, smiling ruefully as he looks down to nudge her foot with his elbow. Then his smile begins to fade as his eyes trail their way up her legs, until they finally get to the image of Little Miss Naughty, smiling at him, situated directly over his sister's camel toe.

(Which is also smiling at him, kind of, but sideways. And OK, maybe she presses her thighs together just a little to emphasize it, but again: biology. Not her fault.)

Justin jerks his head away, jostling her again, and Alex growls at him. "Justin..."

"Look, seriously," he cuts her off, reaching up to scrub the back of his neck. "I really am trying to watch this, sooooo..."

"Fine, then we'll watch it together. Don't get your panties in a bunch," she says, enjoying the way he flinches when she says 'panties', even though it causes half a sausage to roll off her plate onto the floor. She glances down at it, shrugs, then looks up at the TV. "So what's this nerd show that you're spazzing out over, anyw—"

And then the next few seconds become a blur as her stomach heaves, and three rum and cherry Cokes and half of her Hangover Cure jostle each other to be the first to make a return appearance. She swings her legs off the couch to the floor and thrusts her head between her knees, eyes wrenched shut. It's only Justin's quick reflexes that keep her from dumping the plate out of her lap onto the floor.

"JESUS FUCK, JUSTIN!" she shouts between gulps of air.

"I know, I know, sorry," Justin mutters, one hand warm and soothing on the skin between her shoulder blades, while the other snatches the remote up off the coffee table, and mercifully shuts the TV off.

"THE FUCK'RE YOU WATCHING?" she shouts, willing the image out of her brain. "Christ!"

"It was a...medical program," he says lamely. His thumb brushes against one of her camisole's spaghetti straps as he rubs her back, blessedly tearing her attention away from her roiling stomach.

"Medical—? It looked like the motherfucking _Wizard of Gore_!"

"Uh...sorry," he says again, the reference clearly lost on him. "Surgical documentary. I should have warned you, I guess. I just thought you had a strong stomach when it came to stuff like that."

"Not while I'm hung over and eating my breakfast, doofus! God!"

"Sorry," he says a third time, his hand still massaging her back. "Uh, do you want me to get a bucket or, um, hold your hair back, or something?"

"No," she hiccups. "Just keep doing that. It helps."

His hand hesitates for a second, as though he weren't even aware what it was doing, but only for a second. "Um, alright..."

They sit quietly for a few moments, with only the sound of their breathing to break the silence, until finally her nausea passes. Alex takes a deep breath, lets it out slowly, then pulls herself upright to fix her brother with a glare. "OK, you can stop now."

"Oh, right," Justin says, snatching his hand back and laying it awkwardly in his lap. "Are you alright?"

"Fine, fine," she grunts, waving a hand dismissively. "It just caught me off guard, is all. How are _you_ not puking all over right now, though? You couldn't even get through the red band trailer for _Halloween Sorority Party Disaster 4_ without having to leave the theater..."

"That's different. That's gore for gore's sake." He gestures at the television. "This is science."

Alex rolls her eyes and tilts her head to the side. "Justin, please. When they made you dissect that fetal pig in junior year, you fainted."

Justin flushes deeply. "Oh, for like, a second..."

"And you hadn't even cut into it, yet."

"Alright, so maybe I took a couple Dramamine before I sat down to watch this, OK?" Justin snaps. "What's your point?"

"My point is, what the hell are you doing watching surgical documentaries? For fun? On your summer vacation?" Alex juts her chin at the legal pad, forgotten on the floor next to the couch. "And why are you taking notes while you do it?"

"I told you the other day," Justin says, leaning over to pick up the pad and place it neatly on the coffee table, face down. "I'm seriously thinking about going to med school after college. I was just...I dunno...trying to get a head start, I guess."

Alex blinks at him, then rolls her eyes again, because that is just so Justin, it isn't funny. "Really? You were serious about that? I thought you were trying to make a joke."

"What's so funny about me maybe wanting to be a doctor?" Justin asks with a frown. "As Plan B's go, it's not bad."

"I said I thought you were trying to make a joke. I didn't say it was funny," Alex retorts. "And Plan B is our band, remember?"

"No, that's Plan C," Justin corrects her. "As in 'See if Max actually has it in him at to beat both of us in the Wizard competition.'"

Alex scowls at this, the idea that her blueprint for their lives without magic is being relegated to 'Plan C'. But he has a point, so she doesn't argue. Because, duh, Max.

"Can't we just watch something else?" she asks instead. "At least 'til I'm done my breakfast?"

Justin turns his eyes skyward, and huffs, and shakes his head...but then he picks the remote up off the coffee table and hands it to her. Grinning, Alex snatches it from him, turns the TV back on and begins flipping channels before he can change his mind. "Let's see...Scooby-Doo, or a Buffy rerun?"

"Aren't they essentially the same show?" Justin asks flatly.

"Uh, given that one of them often features sexy, half-naked vampires, I'ma say no," Alex says, and that makes up her mind for her.

Out of the corner of her eye, Alex sees Justin go rigid at the words 'sexy' and 'half-naked'. She feels his eyes trailing over her again, until he clears his throat and makes as if to get up.

"Watch whatever you want," he sighs, resigned. "I think I'm just gonna go to the library, and—"

And though chasing him off and getting the TV all to herself is kind of the whole point of this little exercise, Alex suddenly surprises them both by swinging her Uggs back up into his lap, effectively trapping him in his seat.

"You are _not_ going to spend the first Saturday of your summer vacation at the freakin' library, egghead," she explains, when he looks at her in askance. "That's too nerdy, even for you. Besides, this is a good one: Angel and Buffy finally get it on after, like, an entire season and a half of forbidden love, 'will-they-or-won't-they' UST, and it—well, I won't spoil it for you, but it's hot. SO hot. Also, he's shirtless a whole lot, which just contributes to the hot."

"Alex..." Justin sighs. He moves to pick her legs up out of his lap, but hesitates, realizing that would mean he'd actually have to touch her legs. After a moment's indecision, he finally settles on grabbing her Uggs by the ankles...but before he can lift them, she slides one foot out of his grasp, lifts it up over his head, and slides it down between him and the back of the couch.

(And if spreadeagling herself practically right in his face for a split second distracts him enough that she actually gets away with it...well, whatever works, right?)

"Alex, c'mon..." Justin pleads, his voice cracking, as she locks her ankles together at his side. "Don't. Let me up."

Alex smiles back sweetly, and holds out both hands to him, palm up. "Plate? Coffee?"

Justin stares at her, openly confused. And because Justin has always been an open book to her, she can see his inner debate play out in his eyes as plain as day. He can either try to force her to release him—which means tickling her, they way he used to when they wrestled as kids—which runs the risk of escalating things, and even Alex doesn't know what she'll do if that happens. Or, he can play along, waiting her out until she inevitably gets bored, loses interest or falls asleep. She holds her breath for a second, curious to see which it'll be, and oddly unsure which she's hoping for more.

Unsurprisingly, Justin decides to play it safe. With a grunt, he narrows his eyes at her, leans over to grab her plate and coffee mug from his end of the table, and thrusts them into her hands. She beams as she takes them from him, takes a huge swig from the mug, then digs into the remains of her breakfast, her appetite having returned with reinforcements.

Justin watches for a second, then shakes his head slightly, and turns his attention to the TV. Unsure of what exactly to do with his hands, he finally settles on leaning back and lacing his fingers together behind his head, desperately struggling to look more relaxed than he is.

"Y'know, I hate the way they handle magic on this show," he says conversationally, his voice only breaking once. "It's so fake and ham-fisted and cheesy."

"Shhh!" Alex shushes him around a mouthful of pancake. "Shirtless vampire talking!"

* * *

**ii.**

"Do you think I'm not cut out to be a doctor? Is that it?"

"Whazzahuh?" Alex jerks her head up from the arm of the couch and blinks blearily at Justin, silverware clattering on her empty plate as it threatens to tumble off her lap. Again, it's only Justin's reflexes that keep it from crashing to the floor. She realizes that she drifted off to sleep almost instantly once she finished her breakfast—one of the most potent side effects of Alex Russo's Patented Hangover Cure. And while her legs are still kind of loosely wrapped around Justin's middle, they're no longer locked at the ankle. (And, ow, her right leg is actually asleep from the knee down, where it's pinned between him and the couch.) He could easily have worked himself free at any time, probably without her even noticing. But instead he's still sitting there, calmly, watching her...with this oddly intense, forlorn kind of expression on his face.

She reaches up to rub the sleep out of her eyes as Justin returns her plate to the coffee table, and tries to sit up. Belatedly she realizes how high her camisole is riding up after her slide down the arm of the couch—high enough to give Justin full view of her midriff and maaaaybe even a glimpse of underboob. Flushing, she hurriedly pulls it down and smoothes it out before he turns to face her again.

"You don't think I'd make a good doctor?" he asks again, his voice strangely raw.

Alex blinks, and casts a quick glance at the television. Buffy and Angel haven't done the deed yet, but it's definitely heading in that direction, so that means she's been out...what? Twenty, twenty-five minutes?

"Have you been sitting there thinking about that this whole time?" she frowns at Justin.

He barely shrugs his shoulders in response. "Do you or don't you?"

"Well...," Alex says, rubbing at her eyes again, if only because the intense way he's staring into them is starting to make her vaguely uncomfortable. "I'm just surprised, I guess. I didn't think you were serious. Haven't you always said you wanted to build robots, or beat them at chess, or whatever? This whole doctor thing is kind of out of left field."

He shrugs almost imperceptibly again, a gesture that would probably be lost on virtually anyone who wasn't her.

"Up until last week, yeah. Robotic Engineering was totally going to be my major. But then I had College!Justin stuck in my head for a few days, and he just kept thinking—" and here, he puts on College!Justin's hippie voice—"_'Robots are bogus, dude. They're just soulless machines, tools of 'The Man'. It's people that need putting together, broham.'_"

"Yeah, please stop doing that voice," Alex says, cringing.

"It just made me think that maybe I ought to reconsider my priorities, y'know?" Justin sighs. "He also pointed out that, statistically speaking, robots in science fiction tend to enslave and/or destroy humanity more often than they actually benefit us. Which, granted, is a stereotype I've been fighting against my entire life, but it's not exactly an invalid point, either..."

"Justin," Alex cuts him off with a sigh, before his whole nerd rant picks up steam, "College!Justin was kind of a douche. And by 'kind of', I mean he was a _huge_ douche. Even I can say that, and I genuinely liked the dude. Besides, just because you're a complete dorkus for robots doesn't mean you can't help people, too. You help people all the time!"

Justin raises an eyebrow at her.

"OK, so you help _me_ all the time," Alex amends. "But that counts! I am totally people!"

"Barely," Justin says flatly, but he smiles ever so slightly as he says it. "So, you do think I could make a good doctor, then?"

"Um...well..." Alex trails off and looks away, staring blankly at the TV, worrying her bottom lip with her teeth. Justin watches her silently, his concern obviously growing by the second.

"Are you trying to think of a diplomatic way of saying 'no'?" he asks softly after a moment.

"Huhwha? Oh no, sorry, just got distracted by the shirtless vampire," Alex says, turning back to him. "Honestly, dude, you'd make a terrible doctor. I mean really, _really_ bad."

Justin's mouth gapes open as he sits up indignantly. "I would NOT!"

"Oh, thank God!" Alex gasps, taking the opportunity to finally yank her right foot out from behind him. She grimaces as she crosses it over her left leg and tries to massage the life back into it. "Ow ow ow, pins and needles, ow!"

"I would be an AMAZING doctor!" Justin says, using that breathy, scandalized voice again, and despite the pain in her leg, Alex can't help but smile a little.

"Dude, no. You so wouldn't," she says, wincing as she kneads her calf with both hands. "Seriously. You'd totally suck."

Eyes wide, Justin sputters a bunch of random consonants at her, and she actually has to reach up to wipe the spittle off the tip of her nose.

"I'll have you know," he harrumphs, his voice getting more scandalized and breathy by the second, "that every career day aptitude test I've ever taken—"

"—probably hasn't asked you about your sad little Fetal Pig story," Alex interjects. "Or the _Halloween Sorority Party Disaster 4_ story. Or about that time you hyperventilated in health class in third grade when they tried to explain where babies came from. Or—"

"Hey, I'm not the one who almost tossed her cookies before!" Justin protests. "I sat through an entire hour of that documentary before you showed up, making detailed notes, and I didn't even feel queasy once!"

"I was eating breakfast and still half in the bag!" Alex shoots back. "You were completely sober, and you _still_ had to take motion sickness pills! And let's just see how 'detailed' these notes are..."

Both of them reach for the legal pad on the coffee table at the same time, but for once, Alex is faster. She snatches the pad away from him, glances down at its contents, then looks narrowly at him and flips it over, as if demanding an explanation.

Justin doesn't look, but casts his eyes down, locked on a birthmark three inches above her left knee.

"It's...a mnemonic device," he begins, "designed to help me remember—"

"IT'S A CRAPPY STICK FIGURE DRAWING OF CAPTAIN JIM BOB SHERWOOD FIGHTING GIRL SPACE PIRATES!" Alex shouts, throwing the legal pad at his head.

Justin dodges to the side just in time, and the pad sails harmlessly past...until it collides with the blue lamp on the bookshelf just behind him. They both wince as it falls to the floor with a crash.

"Oops," Alex says, in a small voice.

"Yeah, we really should move that," Justin sighs, glancing over his shoulder at the mess. He shrugs and turns his attention back to Alex. "You see, Alex, you may THINK they're girl space pirates, but what your untrained mind doesn't comprehend, is that they REALLY represent—"

"Don't bullshit a bullshitter, Justin," Alex mocks him, crossing her arms just beneath her breasts. (And the audible gulp she gets from him as it tightens her camisole against them is far more rewarding than she would have expected.) "I know you. You only ever doodle when you're trying to distract yourself. Let's face it: you are WAY too squeamish to even THINK of becoming a doctor. And we haven't even gotten into the whole prude factor, yet."

"'Prude factor'?" Justin snorts. "What the hell are you talking about, Alex? I'm not a prude."

"OHPLEASE!" Alex scoffs. She holds up one hand and starts ticking off fingers. "You shower in your gym shorts at school...you still take bubble baths to hide your shame from the world...you flip out if I so much as leave a pair of pantyhose hanging from the shower rod..."

"Do you have any idea how freaky it is to go the bathroom in the middle of the night, sit down, and find yourself staring at what you think is a shriveled little pair of legs dangling before you in the darkness?" Justin shudders at the thought.

"How do you think you're going to handle examining people, Justin?" Alex presses. "Naked people. Ladies! PRETTY ladies! What if that Channel 10 weather girl came to see you with a yeast infection, huh? What then?"

Justin flushes deeply, in his cheeks and behind his ears. "Well, I'm not really planning on being an OBGYN, sooooo..."

"Justin, c'mon!" Alex groans. "What if it was me?"

Justin makes a face. "Uh, Alex, if you're trying to tell me you have a yeast infection, I really don't wanna—"

She cuts him off with a kick to the side, and he grunts satisfyingly.

"Don't be gross!" Alex snarls. "What if I came to you just for...like, an annual checkup, or something? Do you really think you could do it?"

Justin flushes again, even deeper this time, but he shrugs as if it's no big deal. "Sure."

"Oh, COME ON! Seriously?"

"Yeah, why not?" Justin squeaks—and again, his eyes are darting everywhere around the room, landing on everything that isn't her. "I've seen you n-naked before. Hell, we used to take baths together until I was, like, seven..."

"I was FIVE then! Justin, you can't even look at me in my underwear now without freaking out!"

"Pfft, whatever," says Justin, waving a hand dismissively. "I'm looking at you now, aren't I?"

"Actually, no," she says pointedly, swinging her legs off his lap and standing up. "But let's see what happens when you do. Observe."

Watching him over her shoulder until she's sure she has his attention, Alex reaches down and scoops her fork up off her plate on the coffee table. She presents it to him, dangling it from the end in her left hand. After he frowns at her, clearly bewildered, she turns her back to him, holds the fork out to her side at shoulder level, and drops it to the floor with a clatter. Then, her knees pressed tightly together, she bends forward at the waist—ever so slowly—to pick it up.

The sound of Justin hissing his breath in through his teeth as she presents to him is the single most gratifying sound she's ever heard in her entire life. It makes her tingle in places she ought not be tingling.

She springs back up quickly, grinning from ear to ear, then spins on the balls of her feet to face him, casually tossing the fork back onto her plate with a clatter. If Justin was red before, he's gone positively purple now, and he appears to have forgotten how to blink.

"I trust I've made my point," she says evenly, flopping back down onto the couch next to him. "Prude."

"I—" The word comes out as a croak, and Justin has to swallow a couple times before he tries again. "I sincerely doubt most of my patients will be doing the 'bend and snap' for my benefit, Alex. I don't know if you've ever actually been to a doctor, but there it's mostly 'turn your head and cough', really."

Alex deflates just a little. OK, so he's seen that movie, too. She still presses her advantage. "You really think you could examine me without popping something?"

Justin nods, and crosses his legs and folds his hands neatly in his lap, in what must be the least nonchalant way ever. (And, oh God, she was actually thinking more along the lines of a burst blood vessel or something, not...eyyuggh...but given that she's the one who started this, she's totally not going to show him how freaked out she is.)

"Totally," he says. "All it takes is a little professional distance. Clinical detachment. Just like clearing your mind before casting a spell. I think I can manage that just fine."

"OK then, you're on." Alex jumps up off the couch again, then reaches her hand back towards him. "Let's go."

Justin frowns at her blankly. "Go?"

Alex rolls her eyes, and holds her hand to her ear, thumb and pinky sticking out like a telephone receiver. "Paging Doctor Justin. Doctor Justin, to exam room one, please."

Justin blinks, then narrows his eyes at her. The corner of his mouth twitches up in an unfamiliar smirk.

"Alex, are you...asking me to play doctor with you?"

Alex suddenly feels her cheeks burn, but keeps her expression level, her eyes steeled. "What's the matter, Colonel Sanders? Chicken?"

And wow, there's something she hasn't said to him since she was, like, eight. But it still seems to do the trick, because Justin's smirk disappears as his eyebrows knit together in annoyance.

"Ba-kwok!" Alex adds gently, taunting him.

"Fine!" Justin snaps, jumping up off the couch and stepping forward, glaring down at her. "Just let me get my med kit!"

"You have a—? Wait, look who I'm asking. Of course you have a med kit." She thinks about it for a second, then chuckles. "Lemme guess...is it, like, from a Captain Jim Bob Sherwood Barnyard Space-Vet Playset, or something?"

Justin stiffens, and juts his chin out at her in defiance. "I don't have to answer that."

"Noooooo, you don't, Justin," Alex sighs, reaching up to pinch the bridge of her nose. "You really, really don't."

"Just meet me in the lair in two minutes," he growls, holding up two fingers for emphasis.

"Oh, I'll be there," she snarls back.

"Fine."

"Fine!"

And with that, Justin turns on his heel and storms away, taking the stairs on the spiral staircase two at a time as he heads up to his room. Alex glares after him until he's out of sight, then makes her way towards the stairs leading down into the Sub Station. Her stomach protests a little as she bounds her way downwards, and for the first time this afternoon, she curses rum and cherry Coke.

Because it's so totally their fault she's feeling nauseous again. Not at all a sick feeling that maybe, this time, she's finally pushed things too far.

Or, y'know, a nervous thrill that, maybe, she's finally pushed things just far enough.

Nah, it's totally just the rum and cherry Coke. Totally.

* * *

**iii.**

Ten minutes later, Alex paces the lair like an expectant father with the clap as she watches the door. Though her knuckles have long since stopped cracking, she continues to try, a nervous habit she's apparently picked up from Jerry, and _oh man does she really not want to think about her father right now_, so she forces herself to drop her hands to her sides.

"This is crazy, Alex," she mutters to herself, as she continues to pace. "Parading around in your underwear in front of Justin is one thing, but this? OK, so he's probably not going to show, probably would have shown up by now if he was gonna, so you're probably in the clear...but what if he does? What if he does show up and wants to go through with it? Are _you_ gonna go through with it? Because—"

She breaks off, realizing that she's arguing with herself out loud, which is apparently a nervous habit she's picked up from Theresa. Granted, she's not doing it in Spanish, but _holy shit why can she not stop thinking about her goddamned parents?_

And then she freezes as she hears the latch of the freezer door open. Moving quickly, Alex hurls herself down onto the small vinyl bench, throws her feet up onto the table, and picks up an old gossip magazine that's been lying around the lair for months. By the time Justin walks in, she's flipping through its pages with the air of bored impatience that she perfected when she was eleven.

"Good afternoon, Miss Russo," Justin says, in what he probably thinks is a debonair, sophisticated voice. "The doctor will see you now."

Alex waits a half second before she tears her eyes away from her magazine and looks up at him...and despite herself, blinks in surprise. Justin stands before her, looking every bit the part, having changed out of his T-shirt and jeans into a button-down, tie and dark slacks. A stethoscope is draped around the back of his neck, just like they wear them on _Grey's Anatomy_. In right hand is his laptop, and in his left, a black medical bag...with, she notices, the Captain Jim Bob Sherwood logo stenciled across it.

"What's up, Doc?" she deadpans as she looks him up and down. "Does the lab coat come with the playset? Or did you order that special?"

Justin's right eyebrow twitches, and he clears his throat a little, but otherwise lets this pass. "I'm sorry to keep you waiting, Miss Russo. I needed to...uh, refer to some online resources...before I could begin your examination."

Alex snorts. "Wow, Justin...eighteen years and four girlfriends later, and you're still relying on porn sites to show you where all the lady bits are?"

Justin pauses in the middle of setting his laptop and medicine bag down on the table next to her feet, and glares at her. "Actually, I was looking up generally accepted methods for performing a physical examination, if you must know. If this is going to be the first one I ever do, I want it to be as authentic an experience as possible."

"Well, you made me wait here and read old magazines while you took five times as long to get to me as you said you would," Alex sighs, tossing the gossip rag aside. "So from where I'm sitting, it's pretty authentic so far."

"Ha-ha," Justin says flatly, opening his bag to retrieve a pen and prescription pad. He takes a seat in the chair opposite her. "Should we get started?"

Alex feels her stomach lurch again, even as she affects an indifferent shrug. "Whatever. Where do you want me?"

"Oh, there's fine," Justin says, clicking the button on the top of his pen and pressing it to his pad. "So tell me a little about your medical history, Miss Russo. When was the last time you saw a physician?"

"What?" Alex raises an eyebrow at him. "Are you kidding me with this?"

"Establishing a medical history is the first part of any thorough examination," Justin says, "especially when you're seeing a patient for the first time. Tell me about your family, Miss Russo. Any congenital diseases or other hereditary conditions that I should be aware of?"

"My fam—?" Alex wrenches her eyes shut and shakes her head sharply. "Justin, you know my medical history. You've known me since before I was born!"

Justin gives her a pained expression. "C'mon Alex, play along. If we're going to do this, let's do it right!"

"Alright, alright!" Alex snaps. "You want my medical history? Fine. I got my period for the first time when I was twelve—"

Justin's face goes ashen. "Uh..."

"And I've been on birth control pills since I was fifteen," Alex continues, pretending to be oblivious to his discomfort. "No wait—fourteen and a half. Only because they helped with the cramps, though, not because I was actually having sex, or anything."

"Oh...kay?" Justin whimpers. "But what about—?"

"No, that didn't happen until...when was it that Dean told me he was moving away? Last October? November?" Alex shrugs and waves a hand dismissively. "Anyway, what a mess that was. I mean, read all the smutty romance novels you want, they still never prepare you for how much blood there's gonna be your first time—"

"And your grandmother has diabetes!" Justin says, clicking his pen again and tossing both it and the pad over his shoulder. "Fascinating! Let's move on to the actual examination, shall we?"

Alex shrugs again, but can't help the tiny smile that threatens to blossom across her face. She stands up and puts her hands on her waist. "So, where? Right here?"

"No, waitasecond," Justin says, leaning forward and digging around in his medical bag. After a few seconds, he pulls out his wand, twirls it around his finger, then points it at the work bench to the rear of the lair.

_"As a physician I need to prove I'm able, conjure up an examination table."_

And in a flash, the work bench morphs itself into just that.

"I hate how they always have to rhyme," Justin sighs.

"Or be in Latin, I know," Alex nods, taking in the sight before her. She cocks one eyebrow as she turns to her brother. "Stirrups, Justin? Really?"

Justin flushes darkly, and mutters something about 'an authentic experience' again.

"Well, then," Alex says, grinning mischievously and snatching his wand out of his grasp, "in the interest of authenticity, I'm clearly overdressed."

She doesn't say anything, just holds the wand vertical before her and spins it in the air. Another flash—and a deliciously harrowing split second in which Alex feels completely naked—and her camisole and Little Miss Naughty panties are replaced with nothing but a short, thin paper gown.

Justin's breath catches in his throat as he looks at her. She hands him back his wand, wearing a thin, tight smile that tells him, in the unspoken language they've shared as long as either can remember, that he's not the only one who knows how to up the ante here, dude.

Justin lets his breath out slowly as he returns the wand to his bag. "Alright, Miss Russo, if you'll kindly hop up onto the table, please..."

Alex begins to do just that, then lets out an involuntary squeak as her bare bottom touches cold vinyl of the cushioned table. She jumps back off and cranes her neck backwards in a vain attempt to see what's going on back there.

"Hey, I don't think this thing fastens all the way down!"

"Don't look at me," Justin says wryly as he approaches her. "You're the one who insisted you were overdressed. C'mon, up."

Alex pouts at him, but nevertheless hops back up onto the table, wincing just a little as she settles herself back onto the cold vinyl. Her bare feet dangle in front of her, and she starts to kick them back and forth like a little girl on a swingset.

"Knock it off," he scolds, rapping her left knee lightly. (And then they both wince a little, acutely aware of just how much he sounds like their mother, there.) "OK, we're ready to get started. Are you sure you want to go through with this?"

"That's funny," Alex snorts, "I was just about to ask you the same thing."

Justin's eyes tighten at the corners a little. "All right, then. Here we go..."

He takes a deep breath, not even bothering to hide the fact that he's steeling himself. And then he raises both hands, slowly, with careful determination. Alex's stomach does a triple-somersault at the intensity of his gaze as he reaches for her—no going back now—

—and grabs her wrist with one hand, while looking at his watch on the other.

She blinks, then swivels her eyes up to his face. "Justin—? What the hell?"

"Vital signs," he says, without looking up. "Step two. Pulse, respiration, blood pressure...hmm..."

"Hmm?"

Justin grimaces slightly as he focuses on his watch. "Your heart's beating pretty fast, is all. Is everything okay?"

Alex snatches her wrist out of his grasp, and stares daggers at him when he looks up at her in surprise. "Look, let's just assume that I'm, y'know, breathing and everything, and move on, huh?"

"But your blood pressure!" Justin protests, gesturing back to his bag on the table. "I have a real working cuff and everything!"

"Justin," Alex says sharply. "Getting to use all of your little space doctor toys is not the point of this."

"Not for you, maybe," he sulks.

"Justin," she says again, warningly.

He holds her gaze for a moment, then visibly deflates and casts a forlorn expression over his shoulder at his medical bag. "Fine. We'll move on to the HEENT, then."

Alex brightens immediately, the way she always does whenever she gets her way. And OK, she doesn't have a clue what HEENT means, but it sounds promising. Again Justin hesitates a moment, licking his lips, and the surge of anticipation she feels is almost palpable as he reaches for her and—

—begins massaging her scalp.

"What the HELL are you doing?" Alex shrieks, jerking her head away from him.

He stares at her with his hands poised in mid-air, dumbstruck. "Uh, checking for growths, tumors, abnormalities...Head, Eyes, Ears, Nose, Throat. Step three."

"Oh COME ON!" Alex shouts, crossing her arms over her thin paper gown. "God, you are so bad at this! You're deliberately starting with all the boring stuff so I'll lose interest and give up!"

"Uhhh, no?" Justin says, and he actually sounds offended. "I'm starting at the beginning, where you're supposed to start?"

"BUT THAT'S THE SAME THING!" she whines, kicking her heel against the side of the exam table.

"Listen, Alex," Justin snaps—and for once, he doesn't just seem merely annoyed, or perturbed, but genuinely angry—"you're the one who said I'd make a crappy doctor if I couldn't do this. So I'm doing it, OK? Start to finish, beginning to end, the right way. Any time you feel like conceding that you just might be wrong is fine with me. We can end this whenever you want. Otherwise, I intend to show you just how good a doctor I know I can be."

Alex stares back at him, shocked. But then again, not...because really, why is she surprised? This right here is the very essence of Justin, after all. Focused, determined, methodical. Ten minutes with a laptop and open internet access are all he needs to become an expert at something. And the easiest way to push him into doing something—anything—has always been for her to tell him that he won't be any good at it.

But, as usual, he's completely missing her point.

Apparently, he takes her silence as either stubbornness or consent—or maybe a little from column A and a little from column B—because he reaches up and starts palpating her scalp again. This time she doesn't pull away.

"You idiot," she sighs, mostly out of frustration, but partly because what he's doing feels...well, kinda nice. "I never said you _couldn't_ be a good doctor. I just said you _wouldn't_ be a good doctor."

Justin's fingers pause for a second, then move down her head and begin probing the skin just below her temples, above her ears. "And there's a difference?"

"Duh!" Alex says, as if this is the most obvious thing in the world.

Justin frowns at her, perplexed, as the pads of his fingers work their way down into the hollow spots below her ear and behind her jaw. "That makes little to no sense."

Alex closes her eyes, and involuntarily makes a little noise in the back of her throat. Wow. She didn't even know she was sensitive there...

"I'm not hurting you, am I?" Justin asks, a tinge of concern creeping into his voice.

"S'fine," she mutters, and it comes sounding out a lot breathier than she intended. "What the hell is this you're doing, anyway?"

_Because I kind of want you to never stop_, she doesn't add.

"Palpating your lymph nodes," Justin replies.

"Lymph nodes?" she snickers, as he trails his fingers down along the curve of her throat, massaging either side of her trachea. And ohmigod, it's heaven. "Did you just make that up? Because that totally sounds made up."

"No, Alex," he sighs. "They're part of your immune system. Look it up."

"Shyeah, like that's gonna happen," she snorts. She feels Justin draw his fingers from her throat, and she kind of leans forward a little, as if pursuing them, and actually has to stop herself from whimpering in disappointment.

"You're breathing heavy," Justin observes. "You sure you're alright?"

Alex opens her eyes finally, gazing wryly at him. "You're supposed to be the doctor. You tell me."

"I'm going to take a look at your eyes and ears, now," he says, ignoring her. He pulls an...eye-ear-throat exam doohickey, whatever you call it...out of the pocket of his lab coat, then points to the brick wall on the far side of the lair. "Pick a point on that wall about eye level, and keep your eyes on it, OK?"

"Justin, this is retarded," she says, staring at the wall as he peers through the eye-ear-throat thingy at her, standing so close that she can feel his breath hot against her cheek.

"Don't say retarded, Alex," Justin scolds her. "It's ignorant and offensive."

"Ugh! Fine, it's mentally-challenged, then! I'll bet you don't even know what you're supposed to be looking for, do you?"

"Oh ye of little faith," he grimaces, switching from one eye to the other. "I'd offer to explain, but it's technical, and since we both know how science just makes you sleepy—"

"Hey, I still stand by what I told Mr. Laritate," Alex cuts him off. "If they expect people to stay awake during Sophomore Bio, they shouldn't schedule it so damned early."

"You had it first thing after lunch, Alex."

"Exactly! Dude, my sugar coma doesn't wear off until two o'clock, at the earliest!"

"And this is precisely why I'm going to make an awesome doctor," Justin says, bringing the eye-ear-throat thingy closer to her, "while you spend the rest of your life asking people if they'd like fries with that. Because I actually care about things like school and science and, I don't know, graduating."

Alex starts to roll her eyes, but an annoyed tsk! from Justin makes her bring them level again.

"Well, duhr. Of course you're going to get the science and the methodology or whatever right, you egghead," she says. "Because that's what nerds do best. And you're, like, their king or something."

"I'll take that as a compliment," he says drily. He stands upright, pulls some little attachment for the eye-ear-throat thingy out of his pocket and snaps it onto the end of it, then moves to her right side and peers through it into her ear. "Bonus points for your correct use of the word 'methodology', by the way."

"Thanks ever so," she says flatly, even if she is actually kind of proud of herself. "And like I said, you seem to like helping people, i.e. me, so you've got that going for you. But you're still way too squeamish and repressed to actually be any good at it."

"We'll see about that," Justin says, as he finishes with her other ear. "All right, that's about as much as I can do without a tuning fork..."

"A tuning fork? What the hell do you think I am, a Steinway?"

"No, you're not a Steinway. It's used to test the range of your—y'know what? Never mind." Justin crosses around in front of her, pulling a tongue depressor out of his pocket. "Let's just check out your oral cavity, huh? Open wide and say ah."

"What, just like that?" Alex scoffs. "Aren't you at least going to buy me dinner, first?"

"Alex..." Justin growls, even as he flushes all the way up to the roots of his hair.

Alex shrugs playfully. "Well...OK, but it's not every boy who gets to check out my oral cavity on the first date. I mean, even Mason had to wait until—"

"AHHHHHHHHHHH!" Justin cuts her off, poking the tongue depressor into her mouth before she can finish her sentence.

"Ahhhhhhh," she echoes him, opening wide and rolling her eyes as he presses down on her tongue and peers through the ear-eye-throat thingy into her mouth. And though she's still convinced that he probably has no idea what he's looking for, he spends a good five minutes looking for it anyway.

He shoves her tongue first to one side, then the other, lifts it up to the roof of her mouth, then uses the tip of the tongue depressor to probe the little hangy-ball thing at the back of her throat. He seems a little taken aback when she doesn't gag, and when he tries again, she closes her eyes and purses her lips seductively around the depressor, her cheeks hollowing as she sucks on it gently. Justin jerks his fingers away from it as though it might actually burn him.

"Oops, sorry," Alex says sheepishly, slipping the depressor out of her mouth and handing it back to him with a grin. "Force of habit. Mason could get pretty big when he wolfed out. I learned to cope."

"Ugh, I really don't need to hear about that!" Justin makes a face like he's going to be sick as he shoves the tongue depressor and the eye-ear-throat thingee into the pockets of his lab coat.

"Oh please," Alex scoffs. "Testing my gag reflex like that? I know how boys' minds work, even one as dorky as yours. Tell me you weren't wondering if I could deep-throat, just now."

Justin clears his own throat uncomfortably, and changes the subject. "Alright, so that's the HEENT done. You ready to admit you're wrong yet, or should we continue?"

"Depends," Alex replies with a shrug. "What's next, and how boring is it gonna be?"

"Well, let's see," Justin says, consulting the open laptop on the table. "Next up is the..."

He trails off as his eyes go wide, his Adam's apple bobbing up and down as he visibly gulps.

"Is the...?" Alex prompts him, curious.

"The, uh..." Justin closes his eyes, takes a deep breath, and lets it out slowly. "The torso exam."

A mischievous smile begins to spread across Alex's face. "Torso? As in chest?"

Justin swallows deeply, pulls the stethoscope from behind his neck and starts fiddling with the silvery disc part of it. "They are commonly accepted synonyms, yes."

"_Heheheheheheh!_" Alex laughs wickedly, sensing victory within her grasp. "Yeah, I think we'll keep going."

Without looking up at her, Justin sighs and nods in resignation, as though he expected as much. "Fine," he says, pressing the silvery disc part of the stethoscope between his palms and holding them up to his chest. "Just give me a second to-"

"What, pray?" Alex scoffs. "_'Dear Lord, lend me the courage and the strength to feel up my sister'_?"

Justin stiffens and glares at her over his shoulder. "To warm the stethoscope, actually. Unless you'd rather it be ice-cold when I use it on you?"

"Oh. Uh, thanks," Alex mutters. God, he can be such an absolute doll, sometimes. Even when he's also being kind of a dick.

"Don't mention it," he says flatly. Still warming the disk between his palms, he comes up beside her, and jerks his head slightly to the right. "OK, lean forward a little."

Alex frowns at this, surprised. Shouldn't he be asking her to lean back? But she only hesitates a second before she shrugs and does as he asks, because he's Justin, and she assumes he knows what he's doing. Slowly, she leans forward, bracing her forearms on her thighs and clasping her hands between her knees—

—and then she gasps as Justin pulls on one of the ties holding her robe closed. It falls open around her, exposing the bare skin of her back to the air from her shoulder blades all the way down to her ass. And though it really isn't all that cold in the lair, she feels goosebumps pucker up all along her spine almost instantly.

Instinctively, both hands fly to her breastbone and her elbows clamp to her sides to hold the flimsy paper robe in place.

"Jesus, Justin—!" she breathes. "Warn a girl, maybe?"

He snorts in response as he moves around behind her, placing the stethoscope's earpieces in his ears. "Seriously? First with your underwear, then that whole display with the tongue depressor, and now suddenly you're worried about your modesty? Relax, I just need some room to work."

OK, so maybe he has a point, but she'll be damned if she tells him that. She opens her mouth to protest some more, just on general principle, when she feels something cool and metallic press firmly into her back, just above her left shoulder.

"Breathe in," Justin instructs her.

"Wait, what?" Alex sits up a little and peers over her shoulder at him. "I thought you said this was a chest exam?"

"Torso exam," he corrects her, with a smirk. "Upper body. Back totally counts."

"But you said—!" Alex blinks at him, then snaps her head forward, her bottom lip jutting out in a classic Alex Russo pout. "I get it. Classic bait and switch. Dirty trick."

"Breathe in," is all Justin says in response, but there's a smile in his voice when he says it.

She does as he asks, for once in her life, breathing deeply in and out as the stethoscope gradually crisscrosses from one side of her back to the other, all the way down. His gaze on the slow rise and fall of her naked shoulders is like a gentle, persistent weight. It takes everything she has not to turn and glance over her shoulder at him, to look into his eyes and see what he's thinking...because that would give him a chance to see what she's thinking. Which could be...awkward.

"You're squirming," he admonishes her, as the cool metal bell presses against her skin. "Quit it."

"Oh, bite me!" she snaps over her shoulder at him, and out of the corner of her eye she sees him flinch and yank the stethoscope out of his ears as her voice—amplified through her chest—threatens to blow out his eardrums. "You sit here half-naked and see how well you manage! How many different places do you need to listen to me breathe, anyway?"

"Um, just a couple more, actually," Justin replies. Allowing the stethoscope to dangle around his neck, he comes alongside the exam table and tugs on the end opposite to her, bringing it up to a 45-degree angle. "I'm, uh, going to need you to lean back, OK?"

Alex sits up slightly, still pressing the top of her robe to her breastbone, and raises an eyebrow at him. One corner of her mouth curls up in a wicked smirk as she scoots back on the table and lies back. "So this is a chest exam, after all."

"This part is, yes," Justin admits, and as much as he tries to feign composure, his burning cheeks give him away. "I, uh...I'm going to need to pull down your, um...so if you could maybe just cover your...uh...y'know, like hug yourself, sorta?"

Alex's eyebrow arches even higher, and her smirk grows even more wicked. She reaches first one arm and then the other beneath the paper robe, crossing them over one another as she covers her right breast with her left hand, and vice-versa. And even though there's not much chance of him seeing anything, Justin still takes the predictably chivalrous precaution of staring fixedly at the ceiling until Alex signals her readiness by kicking him in the ribs.

"Ngf!" he grunts, then reaches down to lift the top of the thin robe, peeling it off her slowly from her throat all the way down to her abdomen, before he carefully folds it just below her navel and drapes it over her legs.

"Should your hands be shaking like that?" Alex wonders aloud. "I thought good doctors were supposed to have a steady hand."

"I do have a steady hand," Justin grumbles. "It's just...cold in here."

"Dude, it is so not."

"Really? Then why do you have goose bumps all over?"

"I—" Alex's mouth works open and closed for a few seconds as she struggles to come with a retort. "Shut up."

"Uh-huh, good one," Justin mutters, rolling his eyes as he puts his earpieces back in. "Just relax. I'll be done in a second."

"Relax? Gimme a break, I feel ridiculous. Like I should be on the cover of Maxim, or something." Alex snorts as she adjusts her grip on her breasts. "_'Hi, I'm Sarah Michelle Gellar. Do you like magazines that show models and other celebrities holding their own boobs?'_"

Justin's hand pauses in midair, holding the stethoscope's disc thingie just above her skin as he fixes her with a confused look.

"Hello? It was an SNL skit she did?" Alex says. "Topless? Will Farrell was in it? No? Jesus, dude...do you not get any pop culture references that don't involve, like, Klingons or lightsabers?"

Justin frowns and shakes his head slightly, then presses his stethoscope to the right side of her throat, just above her collarbone. "Deep breaths."

"Yeah, 'cause that'll be real easy, what with my arms constricting my chest like this," Alex snarks.

"Hey, that's for your benefit," Justin says, moving the disc to the other side of her throat. "Anytime you feel like letting go, be my guest. I can h-h-handle it."

"Oh yeah, th-th-th-th-that sounded real c-c-c-convincing there, Porky!" Alex laughs. "As if your head wouldn't explode if I so much as reached up to scratch my nose."

"Clinical detachment, remember?" Justin says, as he moves the stethoscope back to the other side of her chest, and down a little. "To me, it's no different than looking at a diagram in a text book."

"You mean the ones hidden under your bed that you just read for the articles?"

Justin glares at her as he nudges her elbow aside and presses the stethoscope to a spot just below the swell of her right breast. "And how would you know what's hidden under my—?"

He breaks off as Alex suddenly jerks away from him with a shriek, her hands lifting off her breasts just long enough to give him the briefest glimpse of her nipples.

"You JERK!" she howls, hurriedly covering herself again. "You did that on purpose!"

"What? How? I don't even know what I did!" Justin says, holding up his hands in front of him. It takes him a second to drag his eyes away from her chest, where she's readjusting her hold on herself. "What happened?"

"I'm ticklish there, egghead!" Alex growls, "As if you didn't already know!"

"Oh, right." Justin purses his lips off to one side and gets a faraway look in his eyes for a second, like he does when he's trying to work through a calculus problem, or figure out a way to undo a spell Alex messed up. "OK, there's a trick for that. Here, give me your hand."

Alex tilts her head to one side, and lifts her breasts a little. "Hi! Hands full, remember?"

"Oh c'mon, Alex," Justin sighs. "You're not so big that you can't manage to cover yourself with just one arm for a few minutes."

Alex glares at him for a moment, then awkwardly draws her left arm all the way across her chest, smushing her left breast down with her elbow while cupping her right one in the palm of her hand. "Yeah, so this is comfortable. Except, y'know, _not_."

"Geez! It's only for a minute or two!" Justin says. His eyes are riveted to her face, and he appears to have forgotten how to blink again, which nearly makes her smile despite herself. Grunting in mock-exasperation, she draws her right hand out from under her left arm, and holds it out to him. He takes it, and places it over his own right hand, which holds the silvery disc part of the stethoscope. Alex grips the back of his hand lightly as he reaches down and presses the cool metal disc to her skin, back in her ticklish spot. She still feels her body tense in response, but it's not nearly as bad as last time.

"Better?" Justin asks, still being oh-so-careful to look her in the eye.

Alex shrugs her shoulders reluctantly. "I guess."

"I'll take that as a yes," Justin smiles. "Deep breath."

Alex breathes in deeply through her nose—and if it's a little shaky, it's only because she's still ticklish, that's all—and Justin's eyes finally leave her own as he turns his attention to the stethoscope, staring at it with the kind of intense focus he usually reserves for potions or the latest issue of Captain Jim Bob Sherwood. She exhales slowly, and he nods to himself, then lifts her hand along with his and presses the silvery disc part to the exact same spot on her right side.

"Justin?" she asks, before she breathes in again.

"Mmmm?" he mutters, without taking his eyes off the stethoscope.

Alex strokes her finger across the skin at the base of his hand, just below his wrist. "You have goose bumps, too."

Justin's eyes flick up to hers for just a second. "Deep breath, OK?"

The corners of Alex's lips turn up in a gentle smile as she inhales deeply, if shakily, and then lets it out, nice and slow. Once more, Justin's eyes take on that far-away look as he listens, and he nods to himself again, apparently satisfied with what he hears. If he notices that her finger is still stroking back and forth across his wrist, he doesn't let on.

"Alright, you can breathe normally again," he says, as he stands upright and slides his hand out from under hers. She doesn't return it to her breast, but instead drapes it lazily over her tummy. "That's more or less the chest exam done. Let's move on to—"

"Pfft! Not even!" Alex sneers. "That was more like an 'everything-but-the-chest' exam!"

Justin blinks at her in surprise, then chuckles nervously and looks away as he drapes the stethoscope back over his neck. "C'mon, Alex...you don't seriously intend for me to—"

"_'If we're going to do this, Alex, let's do it right,'_" she parrots at him, pitching her voice higher and more nasal in an imitation of his. "_'Beginning to end, authentic experience, blah blah freakin' blah...'_"

"I do _not_ sound like that!" Justin protests, scowling at her.

Alex juts her chin out at him. "I just remembered something we didn't cover in my medical history, Doc: breast cancer runs in my family."

"What?" Justin shakes his head sharply. "No, it doesn't."

"Well, I've just decided it _does_," Alex says, "which is something a responsible doctor would want to check his patient for, yes/no? Even if the thought of looking at lady bits gives him a nosebleed?"

"Alex..."

"I'm very worried, Doctor Russo," Alex says, suddenly sounding small and timid. She tilts her chin down just enough so that her brown eyes look up imploringly at him through her lashes. "I thought I felt a lump in shower, yesterday. Could you check it out? Pwease?"

And now it's Justin who's breathing in and out shakily. He chews on the inside of his cheek and looks away across the room. Again, Alex watches his internal debate play out across his features, plain as day, his need to prove himself a capable doctor weighed against the sheer fucked-uppedness of what she's goading him to do.

And despite the fact that she really wants to win, when the set of his jaw and the tightness at the corners of his eyes begin to suggest that he's on the verge of backing down, Alex surprises herself by blurting out "Captain Jim Bob Sherwood would do it for...Jennifer...Star!"

Justin turns his head slowly to look at her, one eyebrow raised, and Alex grins because she knows she's got him now.

"Jessica Moon," he corrects her, in an overly patient voice as he reaches for the arm covering her breasts. "And I'm pretty sure that would be a violation of the Comics Code Authority, anyway."

Alex snorts. "Dude, are you actually gonna check out my boobs, or just stand there talking in Nerd all day?"

Justin glares at her out of force of habit, but there's no malice in it. His hand trembles as he places it over Alex's wrist, and she feels her body shudder in response as his little finger grazes the underside of her right breast. He hesitates a moment, and swallows, clearly having second thoughts, so she raises her eyebrows at him in a silent challenge. His eyes narrow slightly, resolute, and then he wraps his fingers around her wrist, and gently lifts it away from her chest.

She's not sure which one of them inhales louder as he gets his first really good look at her, naked from the waist up. Justin's complexion goes from merely beet red to full-on Cherry Kool-Aid, and Alex's entire body flushes in return.

Justin's eyes are all over her as he sets her arm down at her side, and not with that old familiar intense determination, either. It's a needy, hungry look she's only seen a few times before—once a few months ago, when she walked into the lair unexpectedly and caught him and Juliet tangled on the bench with his hand up her skirt, and once when she was twelve and hid in his closet to spy on him beating off to their mom's Victoria's Secret catalog. Alex feels her body respond instantly, both to the memories and his present scrutiny, her breasts suddenly feeling tight as her nipples stand up at attention.

"Well, look at that," she chuckles nervously as she looks down at them. "Guess it _is_ cold in here."

"I'm feeling kinda warm, actually," Justin says, reaching up with his tie to blot away the few beads of sweat that have appeared on his brow. To his credit, his voice only cracks a little. He clears his throat and sets his shoulders back, struggling to regain his composure.

"Don't pass out on me now, Justin," Alex warns him. "Only one of us knows CPR, and it isn't me."

"I'm fine," Justin growls, and it very nearly sounds convincing. He starts to reach for her, hesitates, then moves to the head of the table to lower it so it lays flat beneath her.

"Sorry," he says. "Works better if you're lying all the way down. Forgot to do that before."

"S'okay," she shrugs, and smiles at the way even the slightest movement of her breasts draws his eyes to them immediately. He takes a deep breath, starts to reach for her, hesitates, then brings his hands together and begins rubbing them vigorously. He smiles at her apologetically as she furrows her brow in confusion.

"Sorry," he says again. "Warming up my hands. Forgot to do it befo—"

"Oh for Christ's sake!" Alex snarls impatiently, and reaches up to grab him by the wrists. She yanks down, hard, nearly pulling him off his feet. He squawks in surprise, holds his palms out to steady himself against her, and then squawks again even louder as he realizes his hands are covering her breasts.

"There," Alex says, holding his hands against her before he freaks out and pulls away. "Examinate away, already."

Justin's eyes and mouth form three perfect O's, and his breathing is shallow and rapid. For a second Alex is terrified that maybe she's finally pushed him too far, that he's actually going to have a real aneurysm this time, and drop dead right then and there. But then, behind his eyes, she can see the science nerd part of his brain start to kick in.

"It's 'examine'," he says, a little breathlessly, because correcting Alex always calms him down. "Not 'examinate'."

"Sooorr-rry!" she says sarcastically, but she grins, because she knows it's going to be fine.

Alex releases her grip on his wrists, and lowers her arms to the table next to her. Justin hesitates, then shifts his hands to either side of her chest. His fingertips begin probing her skin just forward of her armpits and work their way down along the sides of her breasts with a gentle, rolling motion.

"Let me know if I'm pressing too hard, or if it hurts at all," he says.

"Mmmkay," she sighs, closing her eyes and smiling lazily. "Feels kinda nice, actually."

Justin's fingers pause for a split second, then resume.

"Thank you," he says quietly, and he sounds as relieved as he does grateful. "Uh, do you think you could lift your arms up above your head for me, maybe?"

Alex brings her hands up and cradles them behind her neck, her breasts spreading and flattening against her chest as she does. "This alright?"

"Yeah, that'll do," Justin nods, as his fingertips make their way along the undersides of her breasts, towards her solar plexus. Alex flushes a bit, thinking back to the little thrill that shot through her at the thought of giving him a flash of underboob through her camisole, and how ridiculous that seems now. His fingertips reach her ticklish spot again, and she giggles and squirms a little. But instead of admonishing her as she expects, Justin merely smiles fondly at her, stills his fingers until she settles down, then resumes.

"So far, so good," Justin observes as his fingertips come together at her sternum.

"Gee, just what every girl longs to hear," Alex says flatly. "So happy you approve."

Justin grins. "I mean I haven't found anything out of the ordinary so far, is all. Do you, uh...want me to keep looking, though?"

Alex's cheeks burn as she nods, ever so slightly. "It's best to be thorough, right?"

(And wow, there's a sentence she never thought she'd say out loud. Because thoroughness? So usually not her thing.)

"Oh, absolutely! Thorough is best. I wholeheartedly concur," Justin agrees, a little too enthusiastically, and it makes her giggle again. She closes her eyes and lolls her head to the side as he presses the fingertips of both hands to her right breast, skirting the edge of her areola, and begins probing around it, gently but firmly.

And it's so strange, and not just because it's her brother. It's not like this is the first time a boy has ever touched her like this—well, not exactly like this, but whatever—but it's never really done anything for her before. Granted, that might have been because of the boys in question—Dean fumbling to work one boob out of her bra beneath her shirt, groping it as he fucked her urgently in the cramped back seat of her father's car; Mason all tender and attentive and primly British, fondling her like a porcelain doll who might crack if he handled her too roughly—but while she'd always liked the attention, loved the feeling of power it gave her to know what touching her did to them, she'd never gotten off on it herself at all.

And yet here she is, with Justin touching her as clinically and methodically as only he can manage, and not only does it feel all kinds of amazing, it's actually turning her on in ways Alex never thought possible. She was already a little damp down there, from the moment he started touching her throat, but now? She's well on her way to being wetter than she's ever been. Her Little Miss Naughty panties, if she were still wearing them, would almost be soaked right through. Her nipples stand so erect that they actually ache for him to touch them, and she genuinely has to bite her bottom lip to keep herself from begging him to.

Instead, his fingers circle around her breast away from the nipple, and whether it's standard exam protocol or he's deliberately teasing her, she can't tell. It's excruciatingly delicious either way.

His fingertips reach the top of her right breast, just below her collarbone, and pause. Just as she's about to open her eyes and ask what's wrong, she hears him take a deep, shuddering breath, steadying himself. And then his hands transfer themselves to her left breast, and Alex has to reach up and grip the head of the table to keep her hands from plunging between her thighs to relieve the persistent need that's building there.

"Alex?" Justin asks hesitantly, as his fingertips probe in a circle around the edge of her areola. "You alright?"

"Mmmhmm," she replies, her mouth clamped firmly closed, not trusting herself to say any actual words. She presses her thighs together tightly beneath the gown folded over her lap, as much to stop them from quivering as to control the throbbing burn that threatens to consume her.

"We're almost done," Justin says, his fingers picking up the pace as they circle around her breast. "Just a few more minutes..."

He sounds concerned, and it occurs to her that he's probably misinterpreting her reaction as him causing her pain or discomfort. And that's honestly OK, because the sooner he's done, the sooner she can barricade herself in her room with her Magic Wand (the battery-operated one), and frig herself into oblivion. Part of her wants to laugh at how Mister Always Right couldn't be more wrong if he tried, but she doesn't even dare to so much as breathe right now, lest she give herself away...

And then, unexpectedly, it becomes a moot point as Justin gently rocks her swollen nipple between two fingers.

"UNH!" Alex cries, as her head throws itself back and her spine arches clear off the table, completely of their own accord. Startled, Justin releases his grip and starts to draw his hand away, then makes a strangled noise in the back of his throat as she grabs his wrist, then presses his hand back down onto her breast, covering it with her own. She opens her eyes to see him staring back, his eyes a roiling turmoil of confusion, concern and—could that maybe be hope?

"Alex, I'm so sorry," he says, all in a rush. "I swear I didn't mean to—"

"Well, duh. Of course didn't mean to, egghead," she breathes, as reassuringly as she can manage. Then, taking a deep breath, she jumps in with both feet, the way she always does: "But if you think I'm letting you stop now, you're even dumber than you look."

Justin's hand convulses around her breast as he blinks in surprise. And grins.

And just like that, the invisible dam between them—the one they've never talked about, never even acknowledged, but been acutely aware of since they were old enough to stop taking baths together—quietly and irrevocably bursts.

* * *

**iv.**

Suddenly, everything seems to happen all at once.

Justin's hands are all over her, everywhere at the same time, even though his arms are pinned to his sides as Alex gathers the collar of his lab coat in both fists and starts tugging it off of him. He yanks his arms out of the sleeves and palms her breasts, rolling her nipples between the knuckles of his thumbs and forefingers. She groans into his mouth with equal parts passion and sweet relief, and belatedly realizes that they're kissing now, deeply, his tongue wrestling eagerly with hers. She can't remember who kissed who first, decides she doesn't give a damn, and brings her hands up to rip off his tie and start unbuttoning his shirt.

Justin's hands slip from her breasts and slide down her sides, his fingernails raking gently against all the secret sensitive spots where he used to tickle her when they'd wrestle, making her shiver, and she has to break the kiss to throw her head back and gasp for air. He responds by kissing her throat, then cocking his head to the side and nuzzling the hollow spot between her jaw and her ear—the new spot, the one she didn't even know about until today—and she giggles even as she arches her body up into him, because it is just so Justin of him to pay attention like that.

"Oh God, yes, right there," she breathes, without meaning to. And she can tell he's proud of himself for it, because he grunts, nips her gently with his teeth, then begins to suck on it, overachiever that he is. And as much as she loves it—because, seriously, it's like the nerves under his lips are hardwired directly to her clit—she knows that if she doesn't nip this in the bud, she's going to wind up having to wear scarves for the next two weeks in the dead of summer.

And besides, she's ready. More than. A lifetime of near twenty-four/seven foreplay is enough for anybody, especially someone as impatient as she is. Tugging his shirt down off his back, she slides her hands up his bare arms to his shoulders, then back down along his chest, and pushes him up and off of her.

Justin breaks away from her with a surprised frown, doubt creeping into his eyes, and maybe a little hint of fear. "Alex...?"

"You haven't finished my exam yet, Doctor," she says matter-of-factly, out of breath. "And there's one condition in particular I really think you oughta take a look at."

"Oh?" Justin asks, one eyebrow raised uncertainly.

Alex smiles, then bites her bottom lip and nods. She slips her right hand off his chest and places it over his left hand, where it rides low on her hip. His eyebrows knit together curiously as she draws his hand down along the soft curve of her stomach with her own, the creased paper robe rustling slightly as they disappear beneath it. Their fingers trail along the soft skin of her abdomen, muscles rippling beneath them in anticipation...and then finally he's touching her there for the first time. And his sharp intake of breath and the way his eyes go wide as he feels for himself how wet he's made her is easily the sexiest, most gratifying thing in the world, ever.

(Well, so far, anyway. She has plans, after all.)

"Oh my God," he gasps, his face full of wonder, his eyes looking inward. Then he blinks, and looks into her eyes as if seeing her for the first time. "Holy crap."

"I know. It's pretty serious, isn't it?" Alex says, with mock-severity. "I think it bears closer...y'know, scrutiny, or whatever."

"Scrutiny, eh? Nice pull," Justin grins, and she can't help but find it strangely endearing that he makes it a point to compliment her vocabulary even while cupping her sopping-wet pussy in his hand. "Unfortunately, the Captain Jim-Bob Space Adventurer's Med-Kit doesn't include a speculum..."

"Aaaaaand you're ruining it," Alex sighs, rolling her eyes.

Justin grins even wider, like he finds this hilarious, and shrugs. "Guess I'll just have to make do, huh?"

And then Alex gasps as he slips his middle finger into her, up to the second knuckle, and grinds the heel of his palm against her clit as he begins to work it gently back and forth inside of her. She closes her eyes and tosses her head back, reaching up with both hands to grip the head of the table behind her, groaning as Justin slides his finger in as far as it'll go, slips it back out, and then adds a second one on the return. She begins to move her hips, grinding her pelvis against the palm of his hand as his fingers slowly piston in and out of her, stretching and exploring every hidden, mysterious inch of her. She becomes aware that she's started panting, and even moaning a little, and that there's a subtle but nonetheless audible squishing noise every time Justin plunges his fingers into her, as she melts around them like a hot fudge sundae. And though she's more than a bit self-conscious about it, she can't help but find it indescribably hot at the same time. They begin to fall into a rhythm together, slow and steady but gradually intensifying, like old lovers who've been doing this their entire lives. Or new ones who've just spent their whole lives dreaming about it.

And that's when Justin, being who he is, goes for extra credit and starts curling his fingers inside of her as he strokes in and out, in sort of a 'come hither' gesture, brushing his fingertips against the upper wall of her vagina. It's an odd sensation at first, not unpleasant but threatening to take her head right out of the game. She's about to open her mouth and ask him what the hell he thinks he's doing, when suddenly he finds what he's looking for. She bucks her hips and moans his name as her brain turns inside out in an explosion of color behind her eyelids as he brushes her G-spot.

"OHJESUSFUCKINGCHRIST!"

Okay, so that? Clearly not a myth.

Self-consciousness forgotten, Alex writhes against his hand, dimly aware of the sound of her own voice groaning his name over and over. In her mind's eye, she sees flashes of the day she walked in on Justin and Juliet, remembers the look of absolute ecstasy that played across the pretty blonde vampire's features as he fingered her, and the flare of jealousy she felt in the pit of her stomach even as she told herself there was no way Justin could be _that_ good.

But, _sweet holy fuck_, is he that good.

Alex is teetering on the edge, now, her body writhing with a life of its own as she reaches down with both hands and begins kneading her tight, swollen nipples, eliciting a groan from Justin down below that reverberates through her core. And just in that instant when it seems like she might hover on the brink forever, Justin leans forward and begins lapping at the engorged nub of her clit with his tongue, and she lets out a feral cry and bursts like a hurricane all over his face. Grabbing his head with both hands, so hard that they go white at the knuckles, she grinds into him hard, riding out her orgasm. His fingers still even as his tongue lavishes her with attention, eagerly lapping up every last drop of the torrent her body rains down upon him.

Eventually—after exactly how long, she's not entirely sure—the tremors begin to subside, or at least lessen enough that she regains the ability to control her limbs. Exhaling the breath she doesn't remember holding, she untangles her fingers from her hair, props herself up on her elbows, and raises herself with trembling arms just enough to look down at him. Sensing her eyes on him, he flicks her pearl with the tip of his tongue into her one last time, and smiles at the shudder it elicits from her as he pulls away and slowly slips his fingers out of her. He grins up at her from between her thighs, his cheeks flushed and slick with her, his eyes dancing.

"Holy shit," she sighs shakily, returning his grin with one of her own.

"Yeah," he nods, and from the look in his eyes and the subtle tilt of his head, she knows he's both accepting it as the compliment she intended, and acknowledging the gravity of the line they've not only just crossed, but left so far in their rear-view that it's practically a dot, now. "You OK?"

He asks it casually, like it's no big deal, but she knows him better than that. (For one thing, he's using that stupid 'trying to be cool' voice that's never quite worked for him.) And for once, she answers without snark, sarcasm, or outright duplicity.

"Perfect," she says quietly, with complete and abject honestly. "Never better. You?"

His grin returns, twice as wide as before, and it nearly makes her heart burst to see how relieved and happy he looks. But even as her eyes threaten to mist over in a completely uncharacteristic display of girliness, he shrugs and looks down at himself. "Well, since you asked..."

Alex blinks at him quizzically, then props herself up even higher on her elbows to peer over the bottom edge of the exam table at him...and gasps as she realizes that his pants are halfway down his thighs, and that he's gripping his raging, red hard-on in his left hand.

"Oh, wow," she says, impressed. "Somebody sure knows how to multitask."

"Ambidexterity comes in handy when you're mixing certain potions," Justin says, blushing furiously, like a little boy caught with his hand in the cookie jar, even as he slowly moves his fist back and forth around himself. "I've, um, been practicing."

In her mind's eye, Alex sees flashes of fourteen year-old Justin perched on the edge of his bed, through the narrow seam of his closet door, stroking his dick with his left hand as he clutches the Victoria's Secret catalog in his right, staring at a slim, pretty brunette with wide, dark eyes in a sheer camisole and matching panties. _"Oh, Alex..."_ he moans, even as she slips her own hand down past the waistband of her Hello Kitty pajama bottoms...

"I can see that," Alex nods, smiling at the memory. Back in the here and now, she's unable to take her eyes off the tiny, pearly-white drip of pre-come that's oozing out the tip of his cock, and is overcome with the urge to lick it off. And though she's just had her world rocked by the orgasm of her life, her pussy starts to ache again with need. "Y'know I'm no expert," she says, "I mean, I'm not a doctor or anything, but from where I'm sitting, that looks like it must be awfully uncomfortable."

"A little?" he gulps, stroking his dick a little faster in emphasis.

"Heh," Alex smiles, then sits upright and scoots right down to the end of the table, her legs dangling over the edge. She holds out her hands, palms upright, and wiggles her fingers at him. "OK, gimmie."

And that's all the invitation he needs. Justin practically leaps to his feet, hooking one hand behind her neck to pull her into a passionate kiss, even as she wraps both hands around his burning cock. (Much bigger than Dean's, but not quite as massive as Mason's. And though she knows she's supposed to say size doesn't matter, it's honestly a relief either way. Because, seriously, Werewolf!Mason? Ouch. Her cervix is probably still black and blue.) The desperate way Justin groans as she slowly begins to pump him becomes her new favorite thing. And then, just to show him that he's not the only one with a trick up his sleeve, she reaches down with her left hand to cup his balls, then extends her middle finger and strokes it back and forth along the hardened ridge just below his scrotum.

"MMFH!" Justin grunts, and his cock twitches violently in her hand—and, not for the first time, Alex silently thanks the author of the smutty romance novel she stole that from—but amazingly, he doesn't come. Which is something else he's got going for him over Mason and Dean...

And that's what finally makes up her mind. Still gripping him but slowing her hand, she scootches forward again until her butt is riding the edge of the table, then lies back and swings her legs up into the stirrups mounted on either side. Justin's eyes pop open at the sound, and he frowns in confusion as he takes in the scene before him.

"Alex...?"

"Three cheers for authenticity," she grins, settling her feet even as she tugs him gently forward. She takes a deep breath as she shifts her grip on his cock, adjusting the angle of it, and presses the tip of him to her threshold.

Justin gasps, and his eyes go wide as he looks down and realizes what she's doing. He starts to open his mouth to protest, but she reaches up with her other hand and places a finger over his lips, shushing him.

"It's OK," she whispers. "Since I was fourteen and a half, remember?"

And before he can argue, she sort of thrusts her pelvis towards him at the same time that she tugs him forward again, guiding him into her. She's so wet that he glides in with no effort at all, like he belongs there, and she's not sure which one of them groans louder or more gratefully as he sinks all the way to the hilt inside of her. He drops forward onto his elbows, his arms on either side of her, his hair tickling her as it grazes her sternum between her breasts.

And then Justin tilts his chin upwards and looks at her, his body otherwise completely still, his eyes burning into hers with more intensity than she'd ever seen in them before.

"You have no idea how long I've wanted this," he says, his voice choked with emotion. "How long I've wanted to—"

"Shhhh!" she says, leaning forward and cutting him off with a kiss, even as her eyes threaten to mist up again. "Show me."

He does. Slowly at first, cautiously, giving her the chance to adjust to him, because that's who Justin is. And Alex drops her hands down to clench his buttocks, urging him deeper, faster, because that's who Alex is. Blessedly, he takes the hint and follows her lead, reacting to her, answering her whim the way he always does, always has. His hands drop to her hips, holding on for dear life as she raises her buttocks off the table and begins grinding against him. He drops his head to her chest, his lips engulfing first her left nipple, then her right, sucking on them greedily, nipping them with his teeth, making her shudder.

The stirrups rattle mightily next to them as though they might break off at any moment, competing with the subtle _squish squish squish_ of his cock pounding into her, of her pussy gripping and milking him with every thrust. Alex claws at his back, Justin's thumbs dig into her hips, their voices rise higher and higher, until finally he cries out and bursts inside of her, sending her plummeting over the edge after him as his first spasm floods her womb with liquid heat.

For a few moments, it's all sweaty convulsing, trembling aftershocks, and breathy cursing. And then his mouth is covering hers again, fiercely, his hands framing her face as he pours seventeen years of guilt, longing and burning need into a single kiss. Alex braces her hands against his chest and returns it just as fervently, making a noise in the back of her throat not unlike a contented purr. Gradually, he begins to soften inside of her, and passion gives way to tenderness, soft kisses that say everything they've been wanting to tell each other for years, but couldn't find words for.

Finally, feeling dizzy, Alex pushes gently against his chest, breaking the kiss and inhaling deeply to catch her breath. "Sorry, but I've gotta move. My legs are, uh, starting to fall asleep, here."

"Oh geez, sorry!" Justin jumps up, slipping himself out of her in the process, and wraps his arms around her legs to either side of him, gently lifting them out of the stirrups. She winces a little at the pins-and-needles sensation that crackles through them as her circulation returns. And then she smiles and shakes her head as Justin, understanding immediately, sets them down on the exam table and starts massaging the life back into them.

God, but he can be such an absolute doll sometimes. And she loves him to pieces for it.

"What?" he asks her, watching her watching him. "What are you shaking your head at?"

"You, dorkus," she says simply, still smiling. She curls her legs away from him and scootches back up the table, then turns onto her side and pillows her head on her arm, beckoning to him with the other. "C'mere."

Justin steps out of pants, finally completely as naked as she is, and climbs onto the narrow table behind her. He spoons his body into hers, nudging her forward a few crucial inches so that he isn't hanging half off it. She grunts in response as she grudgingly makes room for him. "Geez, Justin...could you have made this thing any smaller?"

"They're not generally built for two," he says into her ear as he brushes her hair out of the way, and kisses the new spot behind her jaw. _His_ spot.

"Well, they should be," she says, reaching back draw his arm around her, snuggling back against him. He fits his hand over hers, intertwining their fingers, and she presses it to her chest so he can feel her heartbeat.

"Clearly," he agrees. "Next time."

Alex lifts her head up off her arm and glances over her shoulder at him, amused. "Next time? Making a habit of this, are we?"

She feels more than sees the shrug he gives her. "Well, we never did settle our disagreement..."

"Uh, we so did!" Alex protests, jabbing him lightly in the ribs with her elbow. "I won, you lost. Deal with it."

"What? How do you figure?"

"Um, you didn't finish the examination? Just like I said you wouldn't? Ergo, you'll make a terrible doctor?"

"_'Ergo?'_ Wow, nice!" Justin dodges to the side as she tries to elbow in the ribs again, but goes too far and nearly teeters right off the edge of the narrow table, before she tugs on his hand and pulls him back at the last second. "Wait, wasn't your argument that I'm too much of a prude to make a good doctor, though? Because I think we've sunk that particular battleship, if you know what I mean."

Alex groans and rolls her eyes at his terrible double entendre. Clearly, if they're going to keep doing this, they're seriously going to have to work on his pillow talk. "_Your_ argument was that you could maintain professional detachment, or whatever. And hello? Not very detached, here. So unless you plan on fucking every single patient you're attracted to—"

"No, just the one," he says, returning his lips to the hollow spot behind her jaw. "Only ever the one."

"Well...good," she sighs, turning her head and extending her neck slightly, allowing him better access. "Because I think the AMA might have a real problem with that approach."

Justin doesn't reply, but disengages his hand from hers, and draws it up to cup her right breast, slowly running his thumb back and forth across her nipple. She feels his cock begin to stir where it's pressed between them, against her ass, growing larger and hotter by the second.

And that? Wow. Because even Werewolf!Mason didn't recover _this_ fast.

"So," she says conversationally, as she swivels her hips, grinding her ass against him, "too close to call, then?"

Justin kind of grunts and chuckles at the same time, even as he bucks against her. "I guess that's about as close to a concession as I can expect to get from you, isn't it?"

"If you want my help practicing, it is," she replies, her breathing growing heavy as she works her hips back and forth, urging him on, enjoying the feeling of him growing against her. "Because we're gonna need to practice a LOT, if you want to become even an OK doctor, Justin..."

"HA!" he laughs once, sharply, and Alex stops what she's doing to look over her shoulder at him in surprise. Justin blinks at her, his grin fading. "What? It was funny! Doctors, practice... get it? Because doctors practice—"

"Shut up, egghead," she sighs, kissing him softly. "We've got a lot of work to do if we're gonna burn the prude out of you, and med school's only four years away. So hurry up and examinate me again, already, huh?"

And so he does. Repeatedly.

_—30—_


End file.
